How the 2,000-Year-Old Man Taught Amy Sherman-Palladino That She Was a Real Jew

I went into my tiny bedroom — a room so small Anne Frank would’ve walked in, looked around, and said, “Really?!” — and put the first album on. Carl is interviewing Mel, the 2,000‐year‐old man. “But I don’t look more than sixteen, seventeen hundred, right?” It wasn’t just the words. It was the way he said everything. And then it dawned on me. That was Jewish. That’s how it’s supposed to sound. And feel. It’s fast and furious and human and exhausted and hilarious. To this day, whenever a discussion of God comes into play, the first thing that pops into my head is Mel saying, “There’s something bigger than Phil.”